What are message segments?

When sending messages with Twilio Blaster, you’ll notice a Segments count in the Status column. This helps you understand how your message is split and charged.

What is a Segment?

A segment is a portion of your message that fits within a specific character limit before it gets split into multiple parts.

  • Standard SMS (GSM-7 encoding): Up to 160 characters per segment.

  • Messages with special characters (UCS-2 encoding, e.g., emojis, certain symbols): Up to 70 characters per segment.

  • If your message exceeds these limits, it will be split into multiple segments.

Why Does It Matter?

Each segment is counted separately when determining cost and delivery speed. The more segments a message has, the higher the cost.

Check Your Message Segments

To see how many segments your message will use, try Twilio's official Message Segment Calculator.

For more details on how message segments work, check out Twilio's blog: What the Heck is a Segment?.

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